"She need not be a real wife," explained Marie eagerly. "Just one who worked. I should be the real wife, of course."
Willatopy considered this proposal gravely. It had certain advantages, for, in his careless savage fashion, he loved the white Marie and her novel attractions. He was exceedingly reluctant to part with her. All this matrimonial fuss worried him, for he had some glimmering of the truth that an English marriage in Thursday Island—the kind of marriage which had bound his parents, and had made him the legitimate heir of Topsham—was something much more serious than the simple native ceremony of the Islands. It might not be easy to put away a Marie wedded to him in Thursday Island.
"My boys will build a hut here," said he at last, "and we will hold a marriage feast. I will take you then. That will be better than the English way."
"No," declared Marie positively, "that would be no more than—this. You could cast me off and go to England, and I should be left here alone on this hateful island."
"My mother and my sisters would be with you," said Willatopy haughtily.
"No. I must marry William, Lord Topsham, in Thursday Island, or—we must part, Willie. I was weak to-day, but I shall not come any more if you will not marry me."
Willatopy gritted his teeth, and Marie was nearer to receiving a hearty whipping than she had been since her nursery days. Nothing protected her except the vague stirrings of Willie's English blood. He would chastise his white slave, John, with unction, but his hand unaccountably shrank from striking this white woman who irritated him so grievously.
He began to speak in a halting fashion, and revealed to the anxiously listening woman the strange new thoughts which were struggling for expression in his awakening mind.
"John says that I must go to England. He says that if I send him away, others will come later. He says that an English Lord cannot live on an Island in the Straits; it is against the law, the English Law, and the Government will come for me. If I try to stay here they will put me in prison. He says that the English Lords are sent for by the King to go to London and help him to rule, and they can't refuse, unless they want to go to prison as rebels. That would be to disobey the King. I love the King, and would not disobey him. If he sends for me, then I must go.... I love you, Marie, but love has nothing to do with making you my wife. I don't want a wife. When the King sends for me he will send for William, Lord Topsham, not for my wife. You and Madame Gilbert are the only white women I have known, close. I want to see other white women, lots of them, before I marry a wife. John says that they will all be my slaves in England, and that I can take my pick among them. I should like that. Of course I could not pick great ladies like Madame Gilbert to be my slaves, at my pleasure, but there will be many others. Like you, Marie."